As for Looney’s Viennetta ice cream, we quickly ate it before it could melt.
“I think we’ve got some fried rice balls in the freezer back home. Shall I go heat ’em up?” Looney offered.
“Those are brown, too!” Mickey and I snapped in unison.
Then I continued, “Real talk, though, who cares if the food is brown? It’s still good! I know it’s partly my fault for making the same thing as Kyou, but hey…Elle’s looks good, at least! Is it homemade?”
Before she responded, I saw Looney smirk at me from Elle’s other side.
“Oh, um, yeah… Technically they’re homemade, but they’re also really easy, so… Anyway, Mickey’s fried chicken sure looks good!” Elle gestured to Mickey’s chicken with her dainty little hand.
“Man, I haven’t had her mom’s fried chicken since junior high.”
“You don’t think maybe I made this?”
“Nope!”
A little anger-diamond rose up over her head. Then, for some reason, one rose up over Elle’s head, too…but it was quickly replaced by a sadness-club. It reminded me of the time I made fun of Mickey in the cafeteria…
Hold on. Maybe I can figure this out.
Every time I insulted Mickey, Elle got angry. Was it because she didn’t want Mickey to feel bad? In that case, why didn’t she get angry when Looney insulted Mickey? On second thought, did Elle mistakenly think Mickey was in love with me or something? If so, then she was probably sad that I was choosing to support Kyou’s crush on Mickey instead. That would make sense.
In that case, all I needed to do was clear up the misunderstanding.
I’ll just explain everything to Mickey and—wait, but then she might figure out that Kyou likes her. Okay then, maybe I should tell Elle that Mickey and I are both interested in other people? No, that’ll just backfire!
“Your cooking is a delight, Miyazato-chan.”
“Hee hee! Thank you, Looney.”
And yet her sadness didn’t fade.
“Ha ha! Yeah, no kidding! This is awesome!”
“Th-thank you!”
Mickey’s joy-spade was bigger than ever—totally at odds with Elle’s feelings. But that wasn’t necessarily a bad thing. Sometimes one person’s joy could overwrite another person’s sadness. Unfortunately, this was not one of those times.
“Yeah, uh, it’s really good, Miyazato-san,” Kyou chimed in courageously.
“Uh…yeah.”
Shot down, just like that. Kyou slumped his shoulders. I looked at Looney, half-expecting her to tease Elle about her awkward response, but instead she looked at me. Then, with a tiny head-tilt, she reached out with her disposable chopsticks and took a big bite of yakisoba directly from Kyou’s Tupperware container without even putting it on her plate first.
“Kyou’sh yakishoba ish—”
“Don’t talk with your mouth full!”
She swallowed hard. “There, happy? Anyway, Kyou’s yakisoba is pretty good, too. You should try some, Miyazato-chan.”
She held the container in Elle’s direction. Clearly, she was trying to change the subject to Kyou on purpose so she could probe Elle’s feelings. This was what I wanted, too, so I appreciated it.
Sadly, this attempt ended in failure. Though Kyou’s was the only dish Elle had yet to try, she shook her head vigorously. “I-I don’t want any! I mean, uh, I’m not that hungry!”
“…Oh. Okay then. I’ll happily consume these calories in your place.”
Looney took another giant bite directly from the container. She shot me a quizzical glance and then began to chew with her usual sleepy look on her face.
As they talked, I watched Kyou the whole time. Frankly, I felt the urge to jump to my feet. But I couldn’t, of course. If I took action right away, Elle would blame herself for ruining the party. Instead, I stayed seated and prayed for Kyou to hang in there.
After a few more conversations and a few pieces of chicken, I looked over at him. “Hey, do you know where the bathroom is?”
He noticed the look in my eyes. “I…I’ll show you.”
He promptly pulled his shoes on. Likewise, I rose to my feet and stepped into my sneakers.
“This way,” he called, and with that, I followed after him. A few dozen steps later, I breathed a sigh of relief. At last, I’d managed to get him out of there. Any longer and he would have crushed us beneath his giant sadness-club. Not literally, of course—the pips weren’t tangible objects—but even then, it was big enough to make me nervous.
“What did I do wrong?” Kyou asked, once we were well out of earshot of the girls. I didn’t need to look at his pip to know how he was feeling, and that was a bad sign. I didn’t have to worry about anyone else seeing his pips, but if Mickey saw the look on his face right now, she’d totally cause a scene. Thank God I got him out of there.
“Something’s definitely up with her.”
There was no point in me trying to reassure him without any evidence. The bathroom thing was just an excuse, but we walked in anyway, just to keep up the pretext.
“Remind me: how long has this been going on?”
“Since the day after my parent-teacher conference.”
“Okay, so something must have happened the day before. Maybe she got upset about something and didn’t tell you.”
As we heeded nature’s call, Kyou recounted everything he could remember about what happened that day.
“I honestly can’t think of anything! We talked the same amount as usual…about normal stuff… We complained about the art essay for history class, but that’s about it. Miyazato-san was the one who initiated the conversation, too, because she didn’t understand one of the prompts… And that same morning, we ran into each other on the way to school, and she gave me a cookie! And I told her it was good!”
“A cookie?” Was it one of those cookies?
“Yeah. She said she made them as a study snack.”
“What kind was it?”
“Just plain little round ones. Did she give you some, too?”
“Yeah, I ate a bunch. They were definitely good.”
“Okay, then that can’t be it! Seriously, why would she get mad at me?”
Good question. At this point, Kyou was well within his rights to be upset with Elle, too. After all, she was pushing him away for no discernible reason. But of course, no anger-diamond ever rose up over his head. Instead, he was deeply worried about having upset her. Once again, I found myself admiring him for being so different from me…but now wasn’t the time to focus on that.
“Maybe I should ask her about it directly?” I offered, since it felt like our only real option. But Kyou didn’t look enthused.
“If she thinks I made you ask her for me, she’ll only get even more upset.”
This struck me as a little paranoid, but hey. “Should’ve known you’d say that.”
In that case, what were we left with? For my own personal purposes, I needed them to restore their friendship, and the cookies were my only clue. Hmm.
Wait, but…I’d asked Elle if Looney or Kyou had gotten to try her cookies, and she’d said no. Why would she lie about that? What harm was there in Kyou eating her cookies? Hmmmm.
“Okay then, I’ll casually ask Mickey about those cookies from the other day. Maybe she knows something. You’re cool with that, right?”
“Well…yeah, I guess it can’t hurt…”
Good, good. Our not-quite-plan was set. Now I just needed to observe everyone’s emotions and think carefully. I would have to wing it, but eh, that was just my style.
When we returned to the tarp, Mickey was wearing a joy-spade overhead, as usual. Looney had both an amusement-heart and a sadness-club, also as usual. Only Elle was out of place with her one giant sadness-club. I plopped down in my previous spot.
I knew if I launched right into the main topic, it’d be obvious that we’d planned it, so instead I decided to start off with something innocuous as a cushion. Something like: funny to think that by this time next year, we’ll all be in college.
But before I could speak, Mickey interrupted me with the world’s most fake ahem. Then she looked around at all of us, and her joy-spade swelled.
“Okay, now that everyone’s here, there’s something I want you all to see.”
Well, this is sudden, I thought to myself, but judging from her spade, it was probably something positive, so I decided to let her have the spotlight. This could very well be precisely the kind of cushion I needed. She fidgeted for a moment, then reached behind her and pulled her book bag onto her lap.
“Ahem! Well, you see…”
Then she paused to look at all of us a second time, with a gleeful grin that was utterly ignorant of how anyone else was feeling.
“Will you spit it out?!” I snapped impatiently.